


Blood Moon

by WraithShadow



Category: Urban Fantasy - Fandom, paranormal romance - Fandom
Genre: Aimee Easterling - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2018-10-11
Packaged: 2019-07-29 12:36:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16264343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WraithShadow/pseuds/WraithShadow
Summary: A human, mated to a werewolf? When Sebastien first stumbled into this world, he didn't think it was possible. But here he was, living with his mate and among her pack for half a year now. But with the blood moon rising, his destiny will be decided in a way he never deemed possible.If you want to know what happened prior to this short story, check out the "Wolf Legacy" series at www.aimeeeasterling.com.





	Blood Moon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aimee Easterling](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Aimee+Easterling).



> This is a fan fiction story to the urban fantasy series “Wolf Legacy” by Aimee Easterling.  
> The events in this story take place about six months after “Huntress Unleashed“.
> 
> Please note that the events in this short story may not be in accordance with future events happening in this universe.
> 
> Thank you, Aimee, for supporting me in a way I never thought possible, offering to distribute the link to this story to your fans.  
> So, I gift this work to you! Thank you for allowing me to write a story in your universe.
> 
> Enjoy reading!
> 
> WraithShadow aka J.C. Seal  
> https://www.facebook.com/AuthorJCSeal/  
> j.c.seal@web.de
> 
> (In case you are wondering, yes, I got a real pen-name now.)
> 
> October 10, 2018  
> This story is not for sale and holds no commercial value.

** Blood Moon **

 

**(1) Pack Bond**

Sebastien Carter woke with a start, his heart pounding erratically in his chest, the dream that had awoken him still very much present in his mind. Not his own dream to be precise, but Ember’s dream, filtering through their mating bond with eerie clarity.

Sending soothing thoughts through the invisible tether that bound him to his mate, Sebastien reached out to touch fur instead of skin, so he found the soft spot under her muzzle, stroking her fur with calming circles until the dream faded out and Ember sank in a deep, restful, dreamless sleep.

Too hyped up to go back to sleep himself, Sebastien pondered about what he’d seen in his werewolf-mate’s dream. He’d told her again and again not to feel guilty that he couldn’t join her on the pack’s weekly hunts, only feel the freedom of running with the pack as second-hand experience through their ever-strengthening mating bond.

Sebastien had given her the option to become a werewolf himself half a year ago, after saving the newly wolf-turned President of the United States. He would have gladly injected himself with the drug that could change every human into a werewolf within minutes without second thought. But Ember had refused, because it wasn’t necessary for him to risk the change when he already held her loving heart in his entirely human hands.

He knew he couldn’t see the mating bond as glowing tether in his mind’s eye the way Ember did, but after discovering that he could not only use it to communicate without spoken words but also see through her eyes, she had urged him to join her on pack activities whenever possible.

So, this dream was probably entirely his fault. She must have picked up on his wish to physically come along instead of passively watching the show like a soap on TV. She probably knew he’d played with the thought to visit Emmanuel Shepard and ask for a syringe of instant werewolf – or instant death.

Yes, part of her wished for him to join her on her hunts, but Ember’s dream had shown him clearly what she feared most of all – losing him! And the odds against making it through the transition alive were high, the President currently the only one still walking the earth on two feet or four paws.

Slipping silently out of bed, Sebastien knew he had to continue sifting through the data until he found the answer why all the others had died within the first hour.

Getting dressed quickly and blowing a kiss through the tether, he slipped out of their cottage and out into Haven’s deserted streets, making his way along the moonlit path to the lab that Wolfie, pack alpha of the Haven clan and also Ember’s dad, had set up for him right next to his own office right after Sebastien had moved in.

The night felt different, Sebastien’s senses strangely heightened while the almost full moon overhead cast dark shadows on the gravel path and the scent of the night rolled across his tongue. Something must have happened to the mating bond again, the world around him looked and smelled like seeing it through Ember’s wolf eyes. Had he gained access to her senses somehow?

Silently opening the door of the office building, Sebastien noticed he wasn’t the only one up at 4 o’clock in the morning. Wolfie was working, typing software code on his keyboard, providing internet security for his clients. But the alpha’s acute senses had picked up his appearance and Wolfie swivelled his chair in Sebastien’s direction.

“Up already?”, the rumbled greeting reached his ears. Then Wolfie cocked his head to one side in a typically wolfish assessment of Sebastien’s state of mind. Being a professor of psychology, Sebastien was well versed in reading other people himself, so he mirrored Wolfie’s actions and replied with a: “Couldn’t sleep, same as you obviously.”

For a moment, the world seemed to stand still as the two men stood facing each other across the room. And then something strange happened. Wolfie’s eyes took on the glowing amber tint that told Sebastien that his inner wolf had taken control. Then, the tethers that bound Wolfie to all members of his pack started to glow, letting Sebastien see the immense spiderweb of connections the pack alpha held within his capable hands.

He could see the thick cable connecting Wolfie to his mate and co-alpha Terra, the second brightest running alongside Sebastien’s own mating bond to his adopted daughter Ember, the young woman they both held dear to their hearts. But there was a tether to every other pack member as well, even to those being pure humans like Sebastien himself.

Then, the strand connecting him to Wolfie started to glow brightly and he felt the alpha’s command rolling towards him like a wave. _TELL ME!_

Sebastien had never been at the receiving end of one of Wolfie’s seldom used commands before, and his mind analysed the situation the way it always did, with scientific objectivity. He wasn’t a werewolf, so Wolfie couldn’t use alpha compulsion against him anyway, so why had he done it? Yet, Sebastien was sensitive enough to be able to feel the tingle of electricity that accompanied it.

But this time, he couldn’t just feel the charged air molecules, this time he could see the command rolling in his direction along the pack tether in his mind’s eye. Instinctively, Sebastien pulled up his shields, squashed his heightened awareness beneath his heel and slammed the door closed. The view of the tether winked out, the compulsion flowing around him the way it always did.

Back to solely human senses the room went dark, Wolfie’s face only lit from the glow of the flat screen monitor next to him. For the fraction of a second, Sebastien could see disappointment flash across Wolfie’s face, then the alpha turned back to his work as if nothing had happened.

Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Sebastien crossed the room and entered his lab, closing the door firmly behind him. What was happening to him. As far as he’d been told, not even all werewolves were able to see the pack tethers, only alphas could. Something strange was going on here, and Sebastien intended to find out what it was!

 

 

**(2) Genetics**

Switching on the lights and powering up his laptop, Sebastien let himself fall into his chair. He noticed that Dale, medical doctor and a human like himself, had been in here, leaving an USB-stick and a note:

 

Sebastien,

More data for you to pore over, I hope you find what you’re looking for. I even managed to get Ethan’s blood sample from the clinic where he got his broken nose fixed, back when everybody thought he didn’t possess an inner wolf at all. I also added all of Haven’s human pack members as well as the pack members from Wolf Landing, with greetings from Hunter and Fen.

Dale

 

Adding the data on the stick to his ever-increasing database, Sebastien opened the new data.

The first one was Hunter. Sebastien had met the uber-alpha only once, but he knew from Ember that uncle Hunter’s mother had been a halfie and his father a human, yet he’d been born in wolf form as a bloodling just like Ember and Wolfie himself had been.

Sure, Hunter had gotten the werewolf gene from his mother, since it was located on the X-chromosome, so far, the theory was correct. Wolfie’s genetic fingerprint looked like Hunter’s, with the wolf-gene clearly visible on the X-chromosome as well. But what made them alphas? Was there an alpha-gene somewhere? Opening the data on Chase, Wolfie’s stepbrother, he couldn’t see any difference in the X-chromosome and Chase was definitely NO alpha at all!

Ember was a full werewolf and alpha, the gene present on both X-chromosomes. But being an alpha among female werewolves appeared to be rather a state of mind, not a genetic inheritance. How else could Fen, a halfie and thus carrying only one wolf gene, still be an alpha at all? This was bringing him no step further along the road, Sebastien thought.

What had Dale written, he’d acquired a blood sample of Ethan before his wolf had emerged? With Ethan’s mother being a halfie, it had been a 50:50 chance for Ethan to turn out fully human, and when he didn’t shift during puberty he’d been thrown out of Haven, his father and former pack alpha not accepting humans in their midst.

Years later, after Wolfie and Terra had taken over the Haven pack and Ethan had returned for his summer holidays, he’d found out that he possessed an inner wolf after all. With the help of a drug originally designed by Dale to change a bloodling into a human prematurely, Ethan had coaxed his inner wolf to the surface, and after being in touch with his wolf and some hard work he’d even managed to shift without help of the drug sometime later.

Yes, maybe Ethan was the odd sock, proving that there was more to being a male werewolf than simple punnet square genetics. So, Sebastien aligned Ethan’s three genetic charts for comparison and sighed. The gene on the X-chromosome was non-existent in all three cases: pre-shift, after the first shift, and even one sample taken from Ethan in wolf form. Which could only mean one thing, the relevant change hadn’t taken place on the X-chromosome at all.

Adrenaline coursed through Sebastien’s body, he’d suspected right. There must be a second gene responsible for becoming a werewolf as well – but where was it located? Since werewolf history stated that an alpha needed to have a son to continue the alpha line, the male alpha-gene could only be located on the Y-chromosome, and Ethan’s dad had been an alpha.

And there it was, a small shift in one of the bands, showing the change from inactive to activated gene. If he hadn’t looked for it specifically, Sebastien knew he’d never noticed the difference at all. Dale’s drug hat activated Ethan’s alpha gene, waking up his inner wolf in the process. Wow, this meant delving deep into the field of epigenetics now! But why wasn’t Ethan an alpha, then? Was the missing gene in the X-chromosome the reason?

 

 

**(3) Breakfast**

So many questions and still no satisfying answers. Staring out of the window, watching the fog slowly dissipate in the early morning sun, Sebastien was distracted by the gentle vibration of his mating bond. Ember was awake and had used the tether to locate him, strumming it like a guitar string.

Turning around, his feet pulled him in Ember’s direction the second she slipped lithely through the door, his arms encircling her slender frame the moment it clicked shut behind her. His senses kicking into overdrive again, Sebastien couldn’t hold back. His mate smelled so enticing, of moss and pine needles and a little bit of wet wolf, combined with the rich chocolate aroma of the cupcake she held in her hand, a smudge of flower from baking it still visible on her lovely cheek. He pounced on her with an urgency that surprised him, but she responded in kind, their lips locking in a kiss that took his breath away.

Everything else was a blur, and Sebastien couldn’t remember how they had ended up naked on his old thinking couch, shuddering from release in a perfect merge of body and mind. His hands rubbing contented circles on Ember’s back, she raised her head to look at him with an amused smile, her wolf clearly visible in her eyes. A low growl escaped Sebastien’s lips, she was so beautiful it almost made his heart jump out of his chest.

“So, you’re not immune to the impact of the impending Blood Moon, either”, she laughed. “Haven has gone completely nuts, and all of Wolf Landing arrived late last night for the Blood Moon celebration this evening. The President will be coming, too! I’d love to stay longer, but I have to get going, there’s still so much to prepare.”

Brushing her lips lightly across his, she rose to get dressed, and Sebastien was shivering in the cool air as her body heat left his side. Hard-pressed not to pounce on her again, he picked up the chocolate cupcake she’d managed to put next to his laptop somehow. “Thanks for the breakfast”, he whispered, not quite sure he really meant the cupcake at all.

“I love you, too! Don’t take too long, I expect you to celebrate with us tonight,” she answered with a smile and then she was gone, leaving Sebastien to pore over the data again with still strangely heightened senses.

 

 

**(4) Alpha**

Still a little shaken, Sebastien licked the last of the chocolate off his fingers before resolutely returning his focus on the all-important data. The pressure on his shoulders had just been increased hundredfold. Blood Moon! If he could only manage to run with Ember tonight. He needed to find the clue, and fast.

Ember had mentioned the President of the United States. He had survived becoming a werewolf, but why? What in his genetic makeup was different from those that didn’t make it?

Pulling up the President’s data, he compared the before- and after-charts. No gene on the X-chromosome before, but the band of inactive alpha-gene on the Y-chromosome was already present, the President obviously descended from a lost line of alpha males! But without the other gene, no wolf.

The after-chart made Sebastien gasp. So that’s what Shepard’s drug had done. It had introduced the missing wolf-gene to the X-chromosome, activating both genes in the process, making the President a full alpha wolf.

Pulling up the data on the other test subjects, Sebastien now found easily what he’d been searching for. No alpha-gene here. And the wolf-gene without an already present alpha-gene had made them shift and then die a horrible death.

Shepard had mentioned to Sebastien back then that the eyes of the wolves had looked empty, devoid of the spark of life that represented the soul in every sentient being. Could it be that easy?

The gene Shepard’s drug had introduced made the shift into wolf form possible, but without a wolf soul to control the body… The President had only survived because his inherited alpha-gene contained a wolf soul!

Shoulders sagging, Sebastien almost folded in on himself. His heightened senses faded out, and his heart felt like being stuck in a vise. He was fully human, the drug would kill him, then. Despair washed over him. No added gene alone could introduce a wolf soul to a human body. He’d never even considered the metaphysical aspect despite having living proof of its existence in front of his eyes every day.

Sebastien didn’t know how long he’d remained in this desolated state, but the pack bond connection and the close proximity must have been enough to draw Wolfie to his side. The pack alpha came up silently behind him, then his broad hands settled gently on Sebastien’s shoulders.

“Tell me!”, he repeated the words from this morning, and then the alpha waited patiently until everything he’d discovered had poured out of Sebastien’s mouth in a steady stream.

“Did you check?” Sebastien was confused. Check what? He must have looked it, because Wolfie repeated: “Did you check your own Y-chromosome?” Shaking his head mutely, Sebastien opened his own file. And there it was, very much present for them to see. He had the alpha-gene?

“Impossible!” Shaking his head in denial, Sebastien finally looked up into Wolfie’s knowingly smiling face. “You knew? How?”

“Not the genetic details, but I suspected it when Ember told me you could watch through her eyes, and my suspicion was confirmed this morning when I could see his presence behind your eyes the first time. That plus the way you have been acting lately. Squinting your eyes at the light when it’s semi-dark, jumping at sounds too far away for human ears to hear, flaring your nostrils at foreign smells… Do I need to continue, or do you believe me?”

“But… if all this isn’t just a spill over from Ember’s abilities through our mating bond, then…” Sebastien couldn’t continue, his voice breaking, his mind still not ready to accept the facts as truth, so Wolfie finished the sentence for him: “… your alpha-gene has already been activated, son. You will run with us tonight!”

 

 

**(5) Doubt**

“But Ethan – he needed more than a year to learn how to shift without help, and without the wolf-gene, how can I…?”

Seating himself on Sebastien’s couch, Wolfie gestured for him to take a seat beside him. “Ethan is still missing the most important part, a mate. Claiming Ember as your mate transformed two single beings into something that is much more than its parts. Joining Ember on her hunts, you both opened your souls completely, the way it’s done on a claiming moon. Being part of that unity in addition to the proximity to other werewolves, the gene was bound to activate itself sometime, and the impending Blood Moon did the rest to draw your wolf to the surface. Now it’s entirely up to you to believe and accept your inner wolf.”

 “But I pushed him down and slammed the door in his face this morning, when you sent the alpha command at me,” Sebastien whispered in shock.

“So, I’ve seen it right after all, I wasn’t quite sure after you completely ignored the compulsion. Did you see it coming? Astounding! Your wolf must be quite powerful already if you could see the tether binding us together,” Wolfie mused.

“Not just our tether, all tethers, I could see all of Haven!” Sebastien rasped, his voice catching on the next words. “And then I broke the connection. Will he still trust me enough to come out again?”

Tears started to spill out of Sebastien’s eyes. Crying felt strange, he couldn’t remember crying since he was 12 years old and had promised himself never to be weak ever again. He knew he should be embarrassed crying in front of Wolfie, but right now, Sebastien didn’t care. He had a wolf, and he’d probably hurt him, or worse!

“Relax, talk to him, tell him you’re sorry. He is part of you, he’ll understand. But remember, he’s only just awoken, so he’s still a pup, too, insecure and scared of your dominant human personality. Be gentle, be kind.” Wolfie fell silent and hesitated, not sure what to do, but then he pulled his son-in-law in a fatherly embrace.

And as Sebastien relaxed into the alpha’s embrace, feeling safe and secure in the other wolf’s presence, Sebastien’s inner wolf uncurled in his stomach, joining his human half behind human eyes again.

“I can see him now and he’s all right, no damage done. Talk to each other, figure it out.” Wolfie rumbled, and with these words, he left the room.

 

 

**(6) First Shift**

If somebody had watched through the window, the following half an hour would have been hilarious to watch. Sebastien was walking up and down in inner dialogue with his wolf, sometimes ceding control to his lupine half while the latter playfully tried to take control of the human body.

 _Can we try to shift now?_ Sebastien’s wolf finally asked, and eager as kids trying out a new toy, they shifted, landing in a tangle of human clothes and unaccustomed four legs in a heap on the floor.

Ouch, did it always hurt that much to shift, Sebastien mused while his wolf successfully tried to disentangle himself, finally standing unimpeded on four enormous paws.

Sniffing the air, Ember’s scent from this morning made all other thoughts flee from his wolf’s mind. _Mate!_ He said, and with the typical wolf’s singlemindedness, they slipped through the not quite closed door - _thanks, Wolfie_ \- in search of Ember.

Haven’s streets were full of werewolves in human or wolf guise, so nobody took notice of this unknown wolf that smelled like pack. Nose hooked onto Ember’s scent and trying not to trip over his own paws, Sebastien’s wolf finally made it to the kitchen door, shoving against Terra’s legs in his hurry to get inside.

Terra let out a yelp and almost dropped the cake she was about to bring outside. “Ember, he’s made it!” Had everybody known about it except Sebastien himself?

Ember was beside him in a second, human arms encircling wolf neck, human eyes locking with his own. _Sebastien! Love, You’re here!_ Ember’s voice filtering down the mating bond was gentle, but the joy that went with it felt like strawberries immersed in hot chocolate fudge.

Then, her beautiful wolf was standing neatly in a puddle of discarded clothes, her tongue licking his muzzle in universal wolf welcome.

Raising his head, Sebastien and his wolf could see the shimmer of red begin to crawl across the moon’s surface, and he greeted it with his very first wolf howl.

And in the blink of an eye, the others were at his side. Wolfie, with an amused smile in his eyes, Terra, looking proud, Hunter with Fen by his side, roughly nudging Sebastien’s shoulder to welcome him to the extended family of Wolf Landing, Ethan, Keith, Chase, Becky and the rest of the pack, even the President, all howling a welcome to the newest shifter of the pack.

 _Our newest pack wolf will lead the hunt tonight,_ Wolfie announced via pack bond, and in an aside to Sebastien: _You know what to do, I’m proud of you, son!_

With Wolfie’s approval, the spiderweb of glowing pack bonds flared to life in Sebastien’s mind again, the whole pack aligning itself behind him. Yes, this wasn’t really his first hunt, he knew what to do, Sebastien mused, donning the alpha mantle Wolfie had ceded to him for tonight with ease. The highest point on pack land would be perfect to greet the Blood moon. And with the goal firmly in mind, together, they ran!


End file.
